


Welcome to Chaos

by jojotier



Category: Dorohedoro
Genre: Action/Adventure, Best Friends, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff, Gen, Magic, Mild Gore, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-22 13:07:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22249960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jojotier/pseuds/jojotier
Summary: A normal day in the life of Nikaido and Kaiman as they chase a magic user- except, strangely enough, it seems that all his power is consists of blasting the same perception-altering song. Even stranger, the magic user is absolutely terrified of Nikaido.Just a little fic where a couple friends do friend things like have a little banter over breakfast, commit murder, and take care of each other.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	Welcome to Chaos

**Author's Note:**

> So dorohedoro has an anime now!! And I am. SO fucking pumped you have no idea. This fic is honestly the direct result of me listening to the op for literal hours after it dropped the first time, just because for some goddamn reason it's about as addictive as crack cocaine? I really wanna write more dorohedoro fic, so this is my first foray into writing these two!! I'm always open to criticism, so if you have any tips on how to improve my characterization, I'd love to hear it!!
> 
> Most of all, I hope you enjoy!

“Oi, Nikaido,” Kaiman said, rubbing his eye as he clumsily stepped into the kitchen, “you hear that?”

Nikaido paused where she was whisking a few eggs together with her chopsticks, glancing over her shoulder at Kaiman. Kaiman, being built like a brick shithouse and as coordinated as one at the best of times, slammed his hip into one of the counters and jumped, giving an exaggeratedly loud  _ “YOWCH-!”  _ before mumbling a string of curses, rubbing his bruised side. An errant onion knocked out of an upturned bowl rolled over the side of the counter and onto the floor. 

Nikaido frowned, but it was less out of genuine annoyance and more out of disappointment for the loss of that onion. “I mean, I can’t hear anything over you wrecking the kitchen- wanna sit out and wait for omelettes?” 

Kaiman perked up visibly at the mention of food and tried to hide it. He didn’t hide it well, but Nikaido wasn’t about to call him out on it. “Hey, don’t blame me when you got all your counters and,” He gestured vaguely with one hand, “things, in the way!”

“Kaiman, that counter is  _ literally  _ against the wall,”

“It’s still in my way!” 

Stifling a little laugh, Nikaido asked, “Need any coffee?”

“Might need an amputation…” Kaiman said, snout turning downward. Nikaido thought that might have been Kaiman’s approximation of pouting, what with the entire lack of lips making it impossible to pout properly. Having a lizard head replacing his human face, presumably permanently, brought with it more challenges that Nikaido never thought of...

“Maybe later- how much cream do you want,” Nikaido hummed to herself, resuming her task. With the eggs beaten, all that was left to do was grab a spatula- and maybe some actual cream, now that she thought about it. She’d been seeing it all over the cooking channel, how in the outskirts of Hole some of those who managed to get wealthy in this crapsack town would add cream to everything… sauces, omelettes, desserts, anything that could be made richer, was. It seemed so delicious when they showed it on TV, underneath all the buzzing stray grains in the image…

Kaiman thought for a moment before he said, “Lots, thanks,” Not seeming to be as torn up about his bruised hip (and possibly bruised ego) as he made it out to be, Kaiman turned and started heading into the living room. “No sugar, though!”

“Ah, guess it’s a good day to cut back on that kinda thing…” Nikaido said offhandedly, thinking. Yeah, it was better to save the money and just make regular omelettes instead. Setting aside the uniformly yellow raw egg goop, she bent to grab a can of evaporated milk for the coffee. Before she forgot, she called back to Kaiman, “Oh yeah! What were you saying earlier?”

“‘Bout what?” Kaiman paused before he was fully gone from the kitchen.

“You said you heard something?” Nikaido watched as Kaiman paused, head cocking to the side as he stared at the wall of the hallway outside the little kitchen. She waited for a few more moments. Okay, was this going to take a while, or… “... Uh, Kaiman?”

Kaiman threw a glance over his shoulder and gave a large shrug. “Dunno! Probably wasn’t that important- don’t hear anything now.”

“Fair enough,” Nikaido gave a half-shrug herself, turning back to her task. Kaiman wasn’t exactly what one might call a morning person, and he’d seemed even groggier than usual- probably just got partially stuck in dreamland or something. Made her wonder what Kaiman dreamt about, though… 

Nikaido melted back into the groove of cooking, heating up her cast iron skillet and trying to find where she’d put the damn oil. She thought she’d stuck it with the lard, but apparently not? She hoped she hadn’t used it all yet- she’d wanted to make something fried tonight… As she began her miniature search through the cracked plaster of the insides of the cabinets, she heard the old TV in the living room cracking on, vague buzz and all. 

Sticking her head into the cabinet beside the sink, she squinted and tried to see if she’d shoved the bottle in the back. Seeing that she had, she reached in, straining a bit to reach- how deep were these damn things anyway?- and then immediately banged her head on the counter above when Kaiman suddenly shouted.

She rubbed her head as she pulled herself out, oil gripped in her other hand a mite too tightly. “What? What’d you say?!” Christ, he better have a good reason for that- maybe he’d suddenly gained his human head, or else maybe he at least remembered whatever he heard...

“I SAID,” Kaiman said loudly enough for the magician’s world to wonder which ghost was causing all the damn ruckus, “COULD’YA STICK SOME PORK IN MINE? THANK YOU!!”

Nikaido took a calming breath, stepped out of the kitchen and into the living room, and beaned Kaiman in the head with the plastic oil bottle. The last of it slowly began to drip out from where it was punctured by the spikes protruding from Kaiman’s skull, but it wasn’t exactly enough to use anyway, so it was fine. “It’s too early to be so loud!” Nikaido complained.

Kaiman made a surprised sound before grabbing the bottle and trying to throw it back at Nikaido’s head. Kaiman complained right back, “It’s too early to throw anything at me!!” Nikaido tilted her head to the side and the bottle slammed into the wall beside her head, slowly clattering to the ground. 

“We’re even then!!” Nikaido said, huffing out a triumphant little breath through her nose.

“Not even close!!” Kaiman claimed, turning around fully in his seat on the couch. 

“Well maybe-” Nikaido paused when, suddenly, she caught the words  _ “... door…. Magic use… stay…”  _ The television caught Kaiman’s attention too, and both turned to the screen to see what was going on.

The well-groomed man on the screen was smiling just a bit too disingenuously, with just a few too many teeth behind his thin lips, as he said,  _ “In a baffling turn of events- a magician has been found wandering Hole, taking to the skies on a bizarre contraption he appears to refer to as a ‘broom’. However, this visitor appears to be different from others,” _

“I’ll say,” Nikaido murmured, eyes narrowing a bit as she approached the couch and draped herself on the back of it. “They don’t always report this kinda thing.” 

Kaiman glanced at her, eyes widening, “Seriously?! Telling people about magic users should be top priority, right..?”

“Not for these media mogul types.” Nikaido said, mouth twisting into a sneer, “They try to hide it but I bet you anything they have magicians paying them off- you’d be surprised how many scumbags wanna profit off of their powers,”

“... Guess it’s not surprising, considering… everything,” Kaiman muttered.

“You’re not wrong,” Nikaido said, and they both turned their attention back to the news.

The anchorman continued to give that tight-lipped smile, sweat shining on his brow, making his face look tacky underneath globs of caked-on makeup and the studio lights.  _ “... this particular magician has yet to be seen attempting to assault any Hole citizens… It is unknown what kind of magic this mysterious newcomer possesses, so whenever he is spotted in the skies, it is advised that citizens  _ **stay indoors.** _ Do not attempt to engage…” _

Nikaido and Kaiman exchanged glances, ignoring the newscaster as he went through the general list of “Tips To Avoid Being Practiced On And Possibly Brutally Maimed and/or Disfigured, If Not Outright Murdered, By Magicians” that did about jack shit to help anyone anyway. Kaiman was the first to say, “We gotta go after him.”

“Yeah- that goes without saying,” Nikaido said, eyebrows furrowing as she rested her chin on her crossed arms, “I’m just wondering what his deal is with riding around and apparently not doing anything- or I mean, that’s what they’re saying…”

“Wouldn’t doubt it if he paid someone off to make it seem like he isn’t doing shit,” Kaiman said, eyes glinting dangerously. 

“Me neither. We should probably be careful with this one… wait to see what he’s all about.” Nikaido said. Kaiman, of course, groaned loudly, leaning into the couch cushions with his head lolling back. Nikaido’s lips quirked down, unamused. “What?”

“Again with the damn waiting game!” Kaiman said, moving to run his hand over his scaly head before pausing. He tried to make it look as if he was fiddling with his spikes instead, but Nikaido had already caught sight of it. (Maybe Kaiman’s human head had hair? It seemed like that kind of instinctive gesture, running his hand through his hair, that suited Kaiman,) 

Nikaido said. “Yeah, I know- but this time it’s important. This guy’s acting weirder than most magicians do. There’s gotta be some kind of reason for it...”

Head rolling so that his snout was maybe a few inches from her face, Kaiman said, “What’s that matter? I’m immune to whatever he can do, remember?” 

“Well, yeah- but you never know what else he might have on him,” Nikaido rationalized, “so the way I figure it, you could go out and see if you can get some info while you grab oil, and then when you get back, we can go out and properly get a good crack at him!”

“Yeah- hey wait,” Kaiman sat up suddenly, wide awake, “When did I say I was going to the store?! We haven’t even had coffee yet!!”

“We can have that before you go to the store!” Nikaido waved a hand, giving a cheeky little smile, “‘sides, I can’t make omelettes like this- you just used the last of the oil,”

“You mean the oil you threw at me?!”

“Yep! That, and I gotta start on prep work for the week,” Nikaido said, finally rising from her knees and stretching her arms up. Her elbows popped with a satisfying  _ crack.  _ “Just ‘cause we’re going hunting doesn’t mean I can leave my Hungry Bug going hungry! I’ll be done with the veggies before you get back,” After all, she still had a business to run! Even if that business had virtually no customers due to this being kind of a terrible place, and due to Kaiman being enormous and intimidating and also full of sharp teeth. 

That seemed to mollify Kaiman somewhat as he said, “And can we get some gyoza for lunch too?” 

“Yeah, definitely,” Nikaido personally couldn’t imagine pausing on the gyoza making for a single day- not only because it was economical and delicious, but because it felt like sacrilege, not making the recipe that had been handed down to her. It was the least she could do, keeping the recipe alive, for the sake of her family… “We can’t do anything on an empty stomach! There’s no use fighting magic without the energy,”

“Yeah, true,” Kaiman mused, “Like with that one group that tried to go after the dragon-making user, remember? They said they didn’t eat, and…”

Nikaido winced, not wanting to think about that particular story. It had been a bunch of teens, most of which were magic victims, trying to slay a dragon that had been loose for a while. (“Dragon” was a strong term- it was actually a tattered inflatable balloon for floats that the magic user had breathed temporary life into.) They went after it on an empty stomach, and one of the two in the group not afflicted by magic had been eaten… Reports said that it had been the group leader’s sister.

“Hey, let’s grab that coffee,” Nikaido changed the subject. Kaiman, thankfully, didn’t press.

“Hell yeah!” Kaiman said, moving out of his seat. Both made their way into the kitchen, and before long, the cold pot of coffee was completely emptied and Kaiman was on his way out into the wide world. 

Nikaido left the TV on just to have some background noise as she brought out some of the fresh vegetables she had on hand, as well as a lone cut of pork. She had the Hungry Bug closed the day after as well, so that was when she was going to get most of the prep work done- but she didn’t see why she couldn’t get a little bit of a headstart that day. Setting the beaten eggs in the humming fridge so that they didn’t get too gross, she brought out her knife and started chopping.

The fall of the knife was lulling, something familiar and methodical that never failed to clear her head. It was a totally mundane task that, after chopping the same vegetables and mixing the same spices, came about as naturally as breathing. It was the perfect way to wind down before as big a job as Nikaido was expecting- first, some time to just cook and not think, then a good meal with a good friend, and then hours spent scouring the streets for a magician to interrogate.

Cabbage and scallions were chopped finely, with garlic and a little onion being minced even finer. Even finer than any of that was a little bit of grated ginger and freshly ground black pepper, and as she set aside the ingredients, Nikaido swore that she could hear some faint music edging in the periphery of her hearing.

Well, she did still have the television on, and the catchy guitar riff could belong to any kind of commercial. Nikaido didn’t pay much attention as she bent down to grab her meat cleavers, idly brushing some cobwebs out of the way. Ah, that was right- she usually did her cooking at the Hungry Bug, and with how busy it was (and with Nikaido being both owner and sole employee) she didn’t have as much time to clean up around the apartment… 

The cleavers were the slightest bit dull, but slashing them against a knife sharpener, and then against each other, had them sharpened right up. Tossing aside the giant mushroom that was on her cutting board for some reason she couldn’t quite remember, she set to work on the pork loin.

Her TV was an old thing that sputtered in and out of usefulness, usually never giving a clear image and having audio that’s just a bit too small. They must have been giving that commercial again, Nikaido thought idly as she heavily brought the meat cleavers into the hunk of meat in front of her. Maybe whatever Kaiman had done the other day when messing around with it had actually fixed the audio, too- because now she could hear the music loud and clear, something catchy and high tempo to really pump up the blood.

For a split second, when she let the blade of her cleaver fall, there was silence. And then, after that, Nikaido wasn’t entirely sure what happened next.

She was certainly still chopping that meat, though! She was chopping it right up, mincing it down to its atoms! It made her long for the cuts of meat in the butcher shop that still had the bones inside, to see if they could be crushed as finely as the viscera in front of her! 

And why shouldn’t she long for that, she thought to herself, watching some of the meat become so fine that it was damn near gooey, falling off the blade-like melting skin and cartilage off of a decaying animal. People made bone broth all the time! It could be the next step to really elevate her recipe…!

The moment didn’t last. The door slammed open, breaking Nikaido from her work-induced haze. When she caught herself, she was looming over a cutting board that was damn near obliterated underneath the hacked meat, flecks of minced pork flecking the stained wall with what would surely become more unidentifiable stains in the future. Nikaido’s cheeks were hurting from grinning so much. 

It was… honestly really goddamn bizarre. She loved cooking- but not… that much. This looked like the work of something inhuman-

That was the moment she realized that it smelled faintly sweet.

Turning, she spotted Kaiman tossing aside a grocery bag as he rushed past the kitchen, heavy footsteps rushing towards the bathroom. The bottle of oil rolled out onto the floor, bumping lightly into an onion that had been thrown away with some force. 

“Shit,” Nikaido murmured, dropping the cleavers into the meat sludge and rushing after Kaiman. The hallway seemed impossibly long, for some reason, more doors than she remembered littering the walls through the cloyingly sweet scent and the faint echo of a female singing voice. She knew because she had made it a habit to count all the doors in her house every night- better safe than anything else. 

The bathroom door was olive green and metal, and beyond it, she heard retching. Gripping the door handle, Nikaido paused. She didn’t know why she hesitated there, the cold metal pressing harder into her fingers as they gripped the mildly greasy surface, but hesitate she did.

Kaiman continued to pant through his retching, and, steeling herself, Nikaido opened the door. The room itself was normal- with the only real change being that the mirror had fogged up from the steam of hot water pouring out of the faucet. Kaiman lifted his head up to look at Nikaido through it, and Nikaido saw that he’d wiped a long horizontal stripe across the glass, and with the condensation slowly inching down, it looked like a large cross-eye over Kaiman’s eyes, mirroring the tattoos he already had. 

Making a disgusted face, Kaiman tried to wipe the vomit off of his mouth as he said, “Sorry… this dude in the alleyway behind the gas station offered me a curry bun.” The sour look on his face turned downright murderous as he turned his face down, looking back in the mirror. “It was fuckin’  _ rancid.” _

“You…” Nikaido was honestly at a loss for words for a moment, staring as Kaiman started trying to clean up the sides of the off-white porcelain interior. He seemed to be struggling to differentiate what was fresh vomit and what were the weird rust stains inside that never washed out. There were a lot of things that she could say to that, but whatever words she tried to articulate didn’t come. Without really thinking, she raised a hand to lightly smack the side of Kaiman’s head,

and in the mirror, she thought she saw a human face.

Her hand caught on his spikes, drawing blood. It beaded in the surprisingly deep slashes of her palm, slowly dripping out one bit by one bit. Drop by drop… Thank God it wasn’t too deep, though. That would have been trouble.

When she looked again, that face was gone- likely having never been there in the first place.

“Hey, hey!” Kaiman said, the brow ridge above his eyes lowering as he turned around, “What the hell was that- that, hey,”

“I was going to feed you!” Nikaido said, wincing when the pain finally hit. God, fuck- that was. Such a stupid move. Magic addled or not, she should have seen something like this coming. “You can’t just accept food from any random weirdo in an alley!! That’s stranger danger 101!”

“Yeah, okay in hindsight, that was dumb,” Kaiman opened the medicine cabinet, grabbing the first aid kit without being asked. “To be fair, he was really cool about the whole thing! ‘Sides, he got turned into a huge bug looking thing…”

“Hmph… is that right,” Nikaido said, lips pursing. Kaiman slowly reached out and took the hand she was cradling and she sighed. “Hey, it’s alright- you don’t have to do anything. I can patch myself up- it’s nothing major,”

“Course I do,” Kaiman said, grabbing some antiseptic wipes that were a little too dry, now that Nikaido felt them. “You were being pretty dumb too, heheh,”

“Hey- only because you took a curry bun from a weirdo in an alley!” Nikaido objected, frowning a bit. “You had me worried, you know…”

“You threw that oil bottle at me first earlier!” Kaiman frowned back, face contorting slightly as he focused on making sure the wound was cleaned of blood properly and wasn’t deep enough to warrant stitches. 

Nikaido finally relented, leaning against the doorframe of the cramped little bathroom as she closed her eyes, trying to clear out that sweet smell. With its departure, she finally realized- she couldn’t hear the dredges of that song anymore.

Kaiman looked contemplative, and Nikaido could only guess that what she’d heard, he must have heard this morning. Instead of bringing it up, Kaiman softly muttered, “... My tummy still hurts…” and those words being spoken as tenderly as possible from a lizard’s mouth was enough to shake a small laugh out of her.

“Would gyoza make your stomach feel better, you think?” Nikaido idly asked, watching Kaiman wrap the bandages around her minor wound with surprising precision. She wondered if this was something like, residual instinct- had Kaiman bandaged up others before he lost his memory, or was he just a fast learner? It could have been both- and if he were a fast learner with whoever else he was bandaging up, Nikaido could almost see herself being a little wistful for it. Whoever was important to Kaiman before must have been a good person- Nikaido just couldn’t imagine him being surrounded by anyone really bad. Lost memories or no.

Kaiman paused, thinking this over with the serious look of a scholar. Then he said,  _ “Fuck,  _ absolutely yes?? Listen,” Kaiman said, suddenly gripping Nikaido’s shoulder with his free hand. “If you had magic, that would be your magic- gyoza that does  _ everything.  _ I bet it’ll do way more than heal this tummyache!”

Nikaido snorted, shaking her head. She got that Kaiman was trying to compliment her, but… “Pfft, who needs any of that? I sure don’t. All I need is plain old good gyoza- no need to be a magic user for that.”

“Damn, true,” Kaiman said, finishing the bandage. “Plus, being a magician is dumb,”

“God, it’s the  _ dumbest,”  _ Nikaido agreed full-heartedly, “I don’t see how all those magicians can go around without hating themselves honestly… like you’d think they’d get a sense for how dumb they are, right?”

“Yeah! Fucking magicians.” Kaiman huffed out a breath. Then, he quietly said, “... Maybe leave the gyoza for later, though? Actually?”

“Ah, so it’s not a good time to test out the healing properties…” Nikaido nodded sagely. “Yeah- let me just put away the meat and stuff really quick, and we can head out. I think it’s high time we raise a little hell, right?”

Kaiman grinned back, toothy and malicious. “You goddamn know it,”

* * *

While she fixed things up in the kitchen, Nikaido told Kaiman about her experience while preparing the gyoza, and the weird pseudo-high that was induced by chopping up that meat. That was when she learned that Kaiman did remember what he’d heard earlier- rock music, with a female vocalist and a vibe that felt otherworldly and psychedelic.

“It’s pretty damn complicated, for a kind of magic,” Kaiman commented as they both prowled some of the busier roads. From what they knew thus far, the magic user wanted to be seen, for some reason, flying around on his broom. 

“Yeah, it is,” Nikaido said gravely, staring up ahead. “Meaning it’s probably damn powerful magic. The more powerful it is, the more complex- and the more it manifests in weird ways.”

“So the user keeps making this song appear…” Kaiman muttered, eyes narrowing.

“It’s no wonder no one’s noticed the effects of it,” Nikaido murmured, head turned toward the sky. It was a beautiful, sunny day. No rain to put a damper on everything- which was good. The rain would only cripple their investigation. “It alters your perceptions- you just think things are going normally.”

“Dammit- you’d think with a giant ass thing like that broom, they would’ve shown up by now!” Kaiman growled lowly, hitting a fist against the palm of his other hand. “When I see that creep, I’m going to make him pay for ruining my lunch…!”

“As if the curry bun didn’t do that…?” Nikaido said, mildly bemused. 

Just before Kaiman could give a rebuttal, there was a scream in the distance, bleeding just a little too much into the territory of a high note being sung to the heavens. Both Kaiman and Nikaido threw their guards up, wordlessly coming to an agreement- the new goal was to find the source of that scream, find the magician undoubtedly nearby, and get that bastard’s head into Kaiman’s mouth.

The sound was emanating from a maze of back alleys and shady doorsteps boarded up or filled with barriers more nervous citizens would avoid, like the odd bundle of scattered needles or sacks of outright fetid refuse. The narrow passageways were lined with debris and discarded plastics so plentiful that it turned the already filthy ground into a faux carpet of trash and grime. 

It took passing by a few terrified people holed up in the buildings falling apart on either side of them (and a dead body- Nikaido winced as they passed, mentally apologizing to the poor man and promising to get some of her old collection buddies to grab him later) until they’d made it to the epicenter of the sound.

Bass thrummed under Nikaido’s heels as the magician stood up ahead, looming over a man who was slowly convulsing on the ground. His mouth was filling up with more foam than should have been possible, hands locked on either side of his chest as the pockmarks on each limb deepened. They didn’t get bigger- they merely seemed to get deeper, darker, filling with blood and pus that slowly oozed out in squirts. The way the man shook his head was too fast to be human, entire body seizing up under the weight of the music, blasting at its loudest volume yet.

“So that’s what your fate’s…” The magician murmured, looking down the large beak of his mask to stare at the man in utter fascination. He only wore a half-mask, covering his nose and mouth with a large, plague doctor’s beak, and which arched up over his cheekbones to frame his eyes with an irregular pattern of bones and feathers. Even without seeing his mouth, Nikaido could see that he was grinning under that mask.

Kaiman wasted no time, and Nikaido let him jump into the fray first. She’d already felt this user’s magic- she wasn’t sure of the extent, so it was going to be safer to let Kaiman get the user’s guard down first and foremost. 

Kaiman brandished one of his knives as he slid in to slash at the magic user’s exposed flank, right where the black skin-tight crop top ended just above his diaphragm. There was a sudden pause in the music as Kaiman grew closer, and quicker than he should have been able to, the magician twisted his body to dodge out of the way, eyes widening.

Using his momentum, Kaiman lurched forward with mouth wide open. The magician, stunned for a moment, took a step back into Nikaido’s miniature trap, just barely dodging the force of her kick by sinking underneath both attacks, rolling more towards the back of the miniature square the convergence of dirty alleys had made. Stepping on the victim’s windpipe without a second thought as he went, the magician launched himself away, eyes frantically searching the walls. 

Bizarrely, when he looked back at Nikaido, all the color drained from his face.

“Dammit! Will you hold still?!” Kaiman hissed, bridging the space between himself and the magic user with three large steps. “I gotta bite you!” The magician ducked underneath the swing of that knife and hopped over Kaiman’s leg, avoiding having his legs swept out from under him. Nikaido quickly glanced between Kaiman, the magic user, and the wall, and formed a plan of attack.

She feinted towards the magician from the right flank, adjacent to Kaiman lurching forward with the snap of his jaws. The magician threw himself quickly backward, unable to dodge the force of the back of Nikaido’s leg jamming into his hip as she twirled into the motion. 

Taking advantage, Kaiman finally curled a large, gloved hand into the user’s shirt, lifting him straight off the ground. “Alrighty! That wasn’t so bad, huh?” Kaiman glanced over at Nikaido, grinning.

“Mm, guess not,” Nikaido said, resting her hands on the back of her head. “Let’s get back soon, alright? I saw a flyer for a sale on the way over…”

“Alright, will do,” Kaiman opened his mouth and, subsequently, had a sweet-smelling bag shoved into his jaws. Kaiman’s eyes widened as he accidentally bit down on the cloth and several fingers instead, ignoring the magician’s sudden cry of pain at several of the appendages being bitten off. 

The magician was dropped suddenly as Kaiman held his jaw, spitting as much as he could out. In two seconds, the magician was slipping away further into an adjacent, dead-end alley, with Nikaido looking between him and Kaiman.

“Go! Hurry and get that bastard!” Kaiman said, holding his nose as an unbearably sweet scent filled the immediate location. “I’ll be fine- jackass just stuck perfume in my mouth!”

“Right!” Nikaido nodded, turning and rushing down that same alley. 

Kaiman called after her, “Just keep him busy ‘til I get to ya!!!”

Nikaido could only chase after the magician, who despite being much scrawnier and weak-looking, was surprisingly fast. The magician soon hit the dead-end wall, cursing unintelligibly to himself as he felt along the wall with the fingers on his uninjured hand.

“Where is it? Dammit, where is it?” The magician whispered to himself, the remaining two fingers on his right hand scrabbling against the grimy concrete. The music pulsed, stuck in a loop of the same song with its same guitar riffs and eerie backup vocals as he finally pulled a large, metallic device out of hiding. 

Lifting his mask up quickly, he bit down into his right wrist with manually sharpened canines, spraying blood and smoke out with a repeated upswell of the music. The smoke flowed into the elongated, wheelless vehicle and it shot vertically up with the magic user gripping a steel bar tightly. 

The fleeing and the loud goddamn music were really getting on Nikaido’s nerves. Grinding her teeth together, she ran faster, pushing herself off of the ground with her left foot and using the momentum to jump onto the scuffed metal wall of a nearby building. From there she climbed up for about a story, hoisting herself onto the ledges of windowsills, before launching herself at the tail end of the user’s enormous broom as it petered, slowing down and speeding up suddenly in little bursts, right past her.

Nikaido sputtered as plumes of blackened smoke swept into her face and blew her hair out of its careful ponytail. She coughed as she hauled herself up onto the back of the magic contraption. 

There had been a couple of incidents with higher profile magic users in the past, of course- but when Nikaido had heard of those brooms, they had been described as shinier, prettier, and all-around looking more like motorcycles and not like some hastily put together shit. 

This magic user must not have been all that rich- the entire thing looked like it was made of junk in what could barely be called a “broom” shape. Thankfully, this clunky thing made for an easy target for Kaiman to launch himself at, when he found a way up to them. 

Nikaido dug her fingers in so hard that the sharp edge of scrap metal began to slice her fingertips. Right on the hand that Kaiman had bandaged up, too… She barked out, “Don’t think you’re getting away that easily!”

“Hiih…!” The magician wheezed, throwing a wide-eyed look of terror over his shoulder as he gripped ever tighter onto the steering bar of the broom. The whole contraption suddenly righted itself, going horizontally through one of the thicker dust clouds of polluted air as its driver started shaking the broom from side to side, trying to shake Nikaido off.

Nikaido held on all the tighter, trying to figure out what the hell was going on. Usually, magic users like this were cocky to a fault- users who were able to incapacitate normal humans, like that old man back in the alleyway, were usually all about confrontation. This magic user had some kind of powerful magic, enough to make a man foam at the mouth in death throes- so why would he be afraid of an apparent human-like Nikaido?

Why wasn’t this jackass using his smoke on her for more than replaying the same stupid goddamn song?

When the user realized jerking the broom around wasn’t getting him anywhere, he drove the flying vehicle into a sudden nosedive, black curls flying every which way as he pulled both himself and Nikaido out of the dirty airspace above Hole and through the dingy streets. 

They flew sharply around corners, the magician pressing himself as tightly to the slightly less jagged metal that made up his seat as possible. He rammed the tail end of the broom into a nearby building and Nikaido gasped in pain as the window shattered underneath her. Several glass shards were embedding themselves into her right thigh and hip, splintering wood driving stakes just below her ribcage and dragging back out of her as the broom nearly careened through yet another broken down building.

It didn’t slow her down- the back of the magician’s jacket was just within arm’s reach, ready for her to yank him down and subdue him. Just as the fingers on her uninjured hand were hooking into the fabric, the shitty magic twink drove them through yet another cloud of pollution (albeit much closer to the ground than the last) and jumped.

Nikaido swore loudly as she shot forward even faster, now alone on this damn thing and with the absolutely terrified magician rolling onto the ground behind. She quickly shimmied her way into the driver’s seat and, with whatever smoke was left, took a sharp u-turn.

As soon as she was headed in the right direction, she spotted Kaiman, finally running in and running out of breath. The sound of the same goddamn song repeated once again, so loud that it flooded the streets and made it impossible to determine the source. It might have been impossible to find the magician if both Nikaido and Kaiman hadn’t caught sight of the slimy little shit rolling underneath the bars of a building that had been ‘under construction’ for some five odd years. 

The broom under Nikaido gave a warning lurch, but Nikaido just held on tighter and forced it into an idle stop. She looked to Kaiman, yelling so that she could actually be heard over the music. “I’ll drive this around to the other side! You get in there and ambush him-! But DO NOT kill him if you can help it, alright?! I have some questions to ask him!”

“Alright!! Got it!” Kaiman said, cracking his knuckles. “No promises that he’ll be alive, but I can do the rest!” He began to wiggle into the thin space between rusted metal bars of two different elevated scaffolding platforms. 

“Wait-!” Nikaido tried to say, but Kaiman was already gone. She bit the inside of her cheek, wondering offhandedly if mentioning that this magic user seemed scared of her would have made Kaiman consider anything differently. The thought, though, wasn’t a good one- might lead to Kaiman getting weird ideas. 

Nikaido drove the broom around the building to carry out her hasty little plan- and to see if she could get the glass out some of these wounds in the meantime…

* * *

Kaiman was gonna rip this son of a bitch’s  _ face off  _ just as soon as he  _ stopped running away, god dammit! _

Because of course the magic user couldn’t just put up a fair fight the second he decided not to use his magic- that’d make things too easy for Kaiman and Nikaido, and well, can’t have anything too easy now could they! Turned out that this magician was just a spineless bag of meat and smoke with no mirrors in sight.

In fact, there was almost nothing in sight in this damn construction place! The whole building was cramped as hell, forcing Kaiman to have to squeeze through or outright rip out way too many metal bars and rotten wooden beams in almost total darkness. The construction crews had never gotten around to installing proper windows, so those openings were boarded up with painted over wood- the only light that was filtering through was the dim gray sunlight filtering in from holes in the cement ceiling. 

And this little twink  _ fucker  _ was able to weave in and around all the different broken down equipment and abandoned scaffolding like it was nothing, eyes frantically searching for an exit. Feeling the blood boiling under his skin, Kaiman yelled, “Hey, jackass! I’m gonna get you eventually!!”

The magic user didn’t have any response to that, because all he did was duck out of view. Kaiman swore, rubbing his hands over his head in frustration. GOD Kaiman wished that he had some hair to pull out right about now! “God dammit- god DAMMIT, where’s some fucking LIGHT in here?!” Of course, that was rendered just about useless when, for what felt like the thousandth time since this stupid chase began, that magician’s fucking song  _ started again.  _ “And can you STOP with the damn music?!”

“This is the only song my magic can make-!” The magician choked out exasperatedly before suddenly falling silent again. Kaiman paused, then grinned wildly to himself. The voice had come just up ahead and to the left- just beyond the uneven spotlight that spilled into the primarily darkened room. 

The damn song was getting louder the closer Kaiman slithered toward that magician, and the closer he got, the more he saw of the twink. 

The magician slowly backed himself into that circle of sunlight, trembling so hard that the fluff that bordered his jacket’s collar shivered around his exposed shoulders like a living animal. Smoke curled at the corners of his mouth, swirling around him in looping spirals of black that never seemed to end. Each grain vibrated against the air, nearly popping Kaiman’s damn eardrums the second the song reached its climax, hitting that shrill scream of a high note.

Kaiman almost made it to him when, suddenly, he realized he’d gotten stuck. Trying to jam his bulky body through the narrow gap between a rusty old bulldozer and a metal wall had been the stupidest fucking idea, and now he was paying for it. 

Dammit! Dammit all- he wiggled, pressing himself as flatly against the wall as he could manage (which wasn’t a lot, but fuck, he was trying!) so he could try and squeeze himself through.

“It wasn’t… supposed to be like this,” The magic user said, pulling his mask down to rest around his neck as he ran a hand down his face, a sheen of sticky sweat visible over his face. “It wasn’t- it was supposed to be normal practice! I didn’t…”

“Even with my magic, I didn’t get to see… my own future…!”

The song had a sudden spike in volume and the magician’s head tilted up, eyes widening. 

Seven metal poles pierced through his body and the music abruptly ended.

The sudden, chilling silence gave Kaiman pause, neck craning so that he could peer through the gap. There had been a partial cave-in- less light filtered into the room, now, partially filled with debris and dust. 

The magic user was pierced through with seven jagged metal spires; four pinning his chest to the ground, one embedded into his left thigh, one embedded into his hip… and the seventh pierced through his skull through the eye, bursting the organ in a splatter of ocular fluid and blood. The magician’s brain bubbled around the intrusion as, miraculously, the magician was still very much alive. 

Kaiman hurried the free himself as the magician seized, squirming underneath the sharp metal like an insect pinned into a showcase. His limbs contorted in on themselves, a sickening gurgle rising from his throat as blood was coughed up. By the time Kaiman had managed to squeeze into the space, half of the magic user’s boyish face was covered into pulsating brain matter and red viscera. Kaiman grabbed the spike that pierced the user’s skull and, with great effort, pulled.

The scream came out was bloodcurdling, tapering off at the end as all the air in the user’s lungs gave out all at once. The blood and brains that flowed from the magician’s now empty socket were pulverized beyond repair, making him look more corpse than human.

And then, before Kaiman could even stick the guy’s head into his mouth, the magic user died.

The magic user’s limbs gave a final shudder and then fell limp. The entire chase, as it turned out, had been for nothing- the little jackass had gotten himself killed without help from either of them. It was probably for the best, to be honest- all those brains did  _ not  _ look appetizing in the slightest.

“Kaiman!” Kaiman’s attention was pulled up toward the ceiling, where Nikaido was peeking into the now significantly smaller hole. She let out a large sigh of relief and asked, “Did you end up asking him your question, at least?”

“No! Damn guy just went and got himself killed before I could even say anything!” Kaiman yelled back, more than a little miffed about the turn of events. All of the smoke left the magician, slowly dissipating into the stagnant, dark air of the construction zone. Kaiman threw his arms up in frustration, shaking his fist at whatever God or whatever else was in the world. “Dammit!! Dammit, dammit, dammit dammit dammit!!! I wanted to stop that goddamn music MYSELF!”

Nikaido gave a little bewildered smile as she called down, “Ah, don’t worry, Kaiman-! Next time you’ll get to bite them for sure!”

Kaiman crossed his arms over his chest, deflating slightly. “I know!! But even then…” 

“Hah…” Nikaido gently puffed out a breath, shaking her head with a smile turning fonder by the second. “Hey, need any help up? I think this thing the magician left still has some smoke in it!”

Kaiman thought for a moment- wondering about the smoke still being there despite the user being dead because damn, that was some resiliency there- and said, “Yeah, could’ya? I don’t know if I can squeeze back out of here again!” Especially with all the structural damage- looking at the skewered corpse of the magic user, Kaiman shuddered. The last thing he needed was to become a Kaiman-kabob!

Kaiman stepped out of the way and Nikaido flew down on the broom, and Kaiman was even able to get on without much ceremony. He held on to Nikaido, wrapping his arms around her waist as the machine hovered just above the corpse. 

Kaiman asked, “So! Do you know how to fly this thing?”

“Oh,” Nikaido grinned over her shoulder at him in response, eyes twinkling mischievously. “I don’t.”

Kaiman held onto Nikaido’s waist in a death grip as they flew away.

Thankfully, Nikaido’s short-lived speed-devilry didn’t last long, because almost as soon as they hit the streets, some blocks away from the magician’s dead body, the broom hovered closer and closer to the ground before coming to a stop. Nikaido made a small disappointed sound and Kaiman let out a sigh of relief, looking back up to thank those same miscellaneous deities he’d been mentally threatening to kill just fifteen minutes ago.

“Welp!” Nikaido said as the broom finally stopped on the ground. “Guess that’s my limit.” 

“Huh?” Kaiman asked, just before Nikaido immediately started falling over sideways off of the broom. He quickly got off and let the broom fall uselessly onto its side, reaching over to try and catch Nikaido. “Nikaido-!” 

Unfortunately, Nikaido had already fallen onto the ground, where she hissed out a pained, “Aw fuck, that’s  _ smarts,”  _ and tried to push herself onto the hand that wasn’t bandaged. 

“What the hell is this about-?!” Kaiman asked, quickly kneeling into the mud beside her and having a look. She’d hastily torn off part of her pant leg to try and patch up some of the wounds in her hip and thigh, slowly bleeding through the fabric. On the hand that Kaiman had bandaged earlier, her fingertips were all sliced up and coated in dusty black residue- no doubt the remains of smoke.

_ Didn’t think that magician brat had it in him to cause this much damage…  _ Kaiman thought to himself.

Nikaido smiled up apologetically at him. “Hey, Kaiman- mind lending a hand here? Might be a bit hard to get home like this,”

“Do you even have to ask?!” Kaiman said incredulously, shifting into a crouching position and turning his back to her. When Nikaido didn’t move, he glanced over his shoulder, gesturing his snout down. “C’mon, get on.”

“Oh! Okay,” Nikaido was able to do that pretty easily, climbing onto Kaiman’s back without much complaint. “God… for some reason, after that guy died, I just got really tired all of a sudden…” 

Kaiman shifted into standing when Nikaido wrapped her arms around his chest, resting her chin on his shoulder to avoid the whole spike situation going on back there. He put his hands under her knees when she brought them up, holding her piggyback while he started to walk. “Don’t doubt it- you got cut up pretty badly by whatever the hell you both were doing on that broom thing. Right after I fixed you up!! Geez!”

“Sorry, sorry- the injury was pretty spur of the moment,” Nikaido apologized, laughing it off. It wasn’t as if she could have controlled it- Kaiman knew that she knew that he wasn’t being serious. “But... I really don’t think it’s the cuts. I’ve been in worse before.”

“So what do you reckon is making you all tired and junk?” Kaiman asked, somewhat skeptical. Sure, they’d both been in worse, but this was a special case or something right? Nikaido had said as much.

“I think whatever that magic was from earlier has fully worn off if that makes sense?” Nikaido mused aloud. “Like it hadn’t fully worn off before…”

“Really?” Kaiman wasn’t sure he was buying that. “It seemed like it wore off before to me! You acted like the same old Nikaido you’ve always acted!”

“Well, yea… but maybe that was the point of the magic?” Nikaido pondered, head tilting to rest against Kaiman’s. “The magic user… seemed pretty scared of me, for some reason. I think I understand why, now. For whatever reason, his magic was making me stronger, instead of making me weaker.”

“Huh, really?” Kaiman blinked, considering it. Now that he thought about it… Nikaido had seemed a little faster than before when they were fighting. Maybe? He’d thought it was an adrenaline thing, but… “How do you figure he did that? I mean, why make you stronger but make that old guy in the alley…”

“I don’t think it was on purpose,” Nikaido said, “I think that that song, whatever it was… I think it made people turn into like… another version of themselves? Kinda like he was seeing something. Fortune telling…”

“Oh! Wait!” Kaiman was suddenly reminded, “Before that guy got stabbed- he mentioned something ‘bout seeing the future…”

“... So maybe I was turned into my future self like a temporary physical manifestation of clairvoyance...” Nikaido said in an oddly subdued tone, contemplative. Kaiman took a second to try and wrap his head around the idea- because if the magic was about ‘seeing’ the future, why did it do anything in the present? And, well, how did the future stuff even work anyway? Wouldn’t that all have canceled out if someone had turned into their future self because then there was technically no future to see, therefore there was no future to make and then the person reverted back? Or was there another even more super special future? What the fuck did the future mean? How could there be clairvoyance if the thing being predicted was happening right in the present-?

“Kaiman… you okay there, buddy?” Nikaido asked, taking a hand away from Kaiman’s chest to wave in front of his face. Kaiman attempted to ruminate for a few more seconds on the schematics of future selves and ultimate selves or maybe past selves? God, what the fuck. “Um?”

“FUCK.” Kaiman suddenly shouted, causing Nikaido to jump, startled. “I’m too stupid to understand this weird magic shit!!”

Nikaido stifled a laugh. “Don’t beat yourself up about it- I don’t get it either. Wanna just forget about it and drown our sorrows in shitty beer and take out?”

Kaiman was about to mention that Nikaido had promised food when he remembered her fingers. They were cut up to hell and back, and even if it wouldn’t impede her cooking per se, it’d likely hurt like a bitch. And she still had prep tomorrow… “Hell yeah- let’s do Greasy’s!”

If he looked over at Nikaido, he’d see her making a pinched, disgusted looking face over his shoulder. “No. No way, absolutely not- anywhere  _ but  _ Greasy Cheddar’s Pizzaria.”

“Aw, c’mon! The mascot's amazing!”

“Charlie “Enjoyment” Cheddar is a menace and you know it.”

Kaiman grinned, “I’ll buy!”

“With what money?!” Nikaido asked, laughing at the ridiculousness of the statement. 

“Let’s get you patched up and you’ll find out,” Kaiman continued, walking a little faster. 

Nikaido gave an overdramatic sigh and slumped into him, shaking her head. “You’re awful. Why do I put up with you…”

“Because I’m super handsome and make your life a thousand times more interesting?” Kaiman probed.

Nikaido paused, thinking. Then she said, “Well, I don’t know about the handsome part…” 

“Hey! Who’s the awful one now?!”

“Still you,” Nikaido said laughingly, “But, you are right about one thing…” She trailed off, shifting to presumably get comfortable on Kaiman’s back. For a long moment, she didn’t say anything, so Kaiman just kind of assumed she forgot what she was going to say.

“... Things are  _ way  _ more fun now that I have you around.” Nikaido finished.

Kaiman couldn’t stop the enormous grin that spread across his face, even though it kind of hurt. Lizard mouths weren’t exactly built for that, after all. He paused on a street corner, making sure they crossed safely as he said, “Well! Guess I better keep it up, then,” 

With that, Kaiman carried Nikaido back to spend another uneventful night at home.


End file.
